By Namik Mehmeti
Memorie.al / I have known Fatos Baxhak since the early 90s, when he was one of the most established journalists in “Gazeta Shqiptare”. I knew him even without introducing him, as he was the nephew of Shkodre, of a Shkodra citizen family, although known as a participant in the National Liberation War; he was not committed to supporting a class war, regardless of party positions. It was his uncle, Vehbi Çanga, who did not make a career in politics (as he was very liberal), and for several years, mainly during the last years of the Hoxha dictatorship, he ran the local newspaper “Jeta e Re” in the city of Shkodra.
I take the opportunity to remember that the first introduction, not physically with the late Fatos Baxhak, was made by his uncle Vehbiu. In the conversations we had in “Kafen e Madhe”, clinking the glasses of brandy, in the presence of his friend the sports journalist Rifat Uruçi, he spoke to us full of satisfaction and enthusiasm about his grandson, the student of those years, Fatos Baxhakun, who would be affirmed as a name respected and sought after by the reader, not only as a historian, but also as a journalist. And Vehbi was not wrong in this prediction.
Although for years I wrote in the newspaper “Sporti Popullor” and then “Sporti Shqiptar”, my acquaintance with the Shkodra journalist, Arlinda Çausholli, who was part of the staff of “Gazeta Shqiptare”, gave me the opportunity to cooperate with this newspaper, since she settled down to live in the capital, I took it upon myself to cover Shkodra’s chronicle, almost every day.
This is how I met Fatos, who spares nothing to open the way for cooperation with the newspaper, but also for meetings in Tirana or Shkodër. Then Fatosi brought me closer to the cooperation with sports journalist E. Çani, so the meetings with Fatosi became even more frequent, why not intimate.
He didn’t forget two articles that resonated in the Albanian press in “Gazeta Shqiptare”, he brought me closer to the collaboration in an interview with Father Zef Pllumi, who had just been freed from the shackles of communist prisons, and another article, with the ex-zogist who escaped in America, Zija Muftija, who defied the State Security, with his escape from Lake Shkodra.
Fatosi often expressed a nostalgia for the Monarchy, King Zog the First, and when he published articles of this nature in the Albanian press, his thoughts approached assessments with objectivity, based on archival documents previously unknown and unused until then.
With the Minister of the Royal Court, the late Abedin Mulosmani, where I was the press spokesman for the Royal Court, during daily meetings, even in the presence of King LEKA I, we had discussed the seriousness and objectivity of the articles written by Fatosi and King Leka I, expressed the desire that in the receptions he was doing in the premises of the Palace of Congresses, with royal legalists, with politicians and deputies of the Assembly, ambassadors and intellectuals from all Albania and Kosovo, he would also meet with the journalist Fatos Bazhaku.
And the appreciation towards Fatos in that reception, it was seen from time to its extension, in a conversation that showed that King Leka I was quite attentive and appreciative of the interlocutor’s lecture. After we returned with a clink of glasses from a single cognac “Skenderbeg” that the King enjoyed a lot (as much as Fatosi), the well-known operator and photojournalist Ilia Terpini, shot the camera, capturing a beautiful and symbolic memory.
I remember that in those days, Fatos Baxhaku had written a long article, illustrated with photos, about the marriage of King Zog I with Queen Geraldine in Tirana, which King Leka I was extremely impressed with, since many of he saw and enjoyed the photos for the first time. That article published in the magazine ‘Klan’ remained as a symbolic gift to the Royal Family.
After we parted with King Leka I, Minister Mulosmani invited Fatos for a dinner at the Royal Residence, on “Elbasan Street”. While the official working day for King Leka I was closing, at one point he expressed the highest regard for Fatos, having the good fortune to meet with a reputable intellectual and historian, where the presentation of archived documents for the Zogist Monarchy , King Leka I, was known for the first time.
Fatos and I parted physically, when I settled in Firenze as a family, but in our phone conversations, he always reminded me of the pleasure he gave him in the city of Shkodra and the lake in Shiroka, where we enjoyed most of the types of fish, smoked squid. Memorie.al
